SB 1011 California Senate · 2025-2026 Regular Session

Energy: Utility Infrastructure AI Safety, Oversight, and Workforce Protection Act.

Summary

Existing law vests the Public Utilities Commission with regulatory jurisdiction over public utilities, including electrical corporations and gas corporations, while local publicly owned electric utilities are under the direction of their governing boards. Existing law requires every public utility to furnish and maintain adequate, efficient, just, and reasonable service, instrumentalities, equipment, and facilities, as are necessary to promote the safety, health, comfort, and convenience of its customers, its employees, and the public. This bill would require the commission, on or before January 1, 2028, to adopt standards for an electrical or gas corporation's use of artificial intelligence models, as provided. The bill would require the commission to direct an electrical or gas corporation to file a plan that demonstrates the corporation's compliance with those standards. The bill would authorize the commission to prohibit an electrical or gas corporation's use of an artificial intelligence model if the commission finds that deployment of the artificial intelligence model would negatively impact the provision of safe, affordable, and reliable electrical or gas service. The bill would require each community choice aggregator and local publicly owned electric utility to adopt a policy regarding its use of an artificial intelligence model that is consistent with the standards. Under existing law, a violation of an order, decision, rule, direction, demand, or requirement of the commission is a crime. Because a violation of a commission action implementing those requirements would be a crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. Additionally, by imposing new duties on local publicly owned electric utilities, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for specified reasons.

Issues: ✓ Energy ✓ Technology

Bill status in committee 1 of 4 stages cleared

Introduction

Feb 2026

Committee Review

Floor Vote

Governor

Introduced Feb 10, 2026 Last action May 28, 2026

Maddy AI version diff · 3 comparisons

What changed between versions

04/22/26 - Amended Senate → 05/18/26 - Amended Senate · 8 edits · May 18, 2026

MODERATE

The May 18 amendment fundamentally restructures SB 1011 from a detailed prescriptive regulatory framework into a standards-setting approach. All specific operational requirements (staging periods, incident reporting deadlines, labor notice provisions, enforcement penalties) are removed and replaced with a requirement that the PUC adopt standards by January 1, 2028. The bill also shifts terminology from 'automated decision systems' to 'artificial intelligence models' and narrows direct regulatory obligations primarily to privately owned electrical and gas corporations.

SCOPE

The bill's core approach changed from directly imposing specific operational requirements on utilities to requiring the PUC to adopt standards by January 1, 2028 that will contain those requirements. This gives the commission flexibility to tailor rules through rulemaking rather than fixing them in statute.

Direct regulatory obligations now focus on electrical corporations and gas corporations (privately owned utilities). Community choice aggregators and local publicly owned electric utilities have a lighter obligation to adopt a policy consistent with PUC standards, rather than being subject to the same detailed requirements as privately owned utilities.

REQUIREMENT

All detailed operational sections were removed, including: mandatory 18-month staging mode before deployment, 24-hour incident reporting and 30-day root-cause reports, safety plan filing requirements with specific content (model version, training data, bias testing, cybersecurity controls), system records modification rules, annual monitoring reports, and audit trail retention requirements.

A new standard requirement was added in Section 8511(a)(6) requiring PUC standards to 'identify and establish requirements for human review and approval of any use of artificial intelligence that is high risk, safety sensitive, or would have a material operational impact.' This serves as a catch-all provision.

The workforce protection provision in Section 8511(a)(5) was strengthened: the April version required utilities to self-demonstrate sufficient staffing for human review, while the May version adds that staffing levels must be 'sufficient to support meaningful human review and approval processes, as determined by the commission,' shifting the determination authority to the PUC.

ELIGIBILITY

The 180-day advance notice requirement to labor organizations before introducing technological changes involving AI, the joint retraining program requirement, and the prohibition on layoffs without exhausting retraining/redeployment options were all removed from the bill text.

DEFINITION

The term 'automated decision system' (with its detailed definition and exclusions like spam filters, firewalls, calculators) was replaced with 'artificial intelligence model' defined as an engineered or machine-based system that infers from input how to generate outputs. The definitions for 'high-risk automated decision system,' 'provenance log,' 'staging mode,' 'system records,' 'technological change,' and 'vendor supply chain disclosure' were all removed.

ENFORCEMENT

Specific enforcement provisions were removed, including penalties under Section 2108 and Section 2110 of the Public Utilities Code for privately owned utilities, and the annual compliance certification requirement for publicly owned utilities to their governing board and the Energy Commission.

02/10/26 - Introduced → 04/22/26 - Amended Senate · 8 edits · Apr 22, 2026

MODERATE

SB 1011 was substantially expanded in the Senate to add a new regulatory framework specifically for artificial intelligence models used by utilities, layered on top of the existing automated decision system provisions. The amendment requires the PUC to adopt AI model standards by January 1, 2028, gives the commission authority to prohibit specific AI deployments, extends coverage to community choice aggregators and local publicly owned electric utilities, and strengthens workforce protections against understaffing of human review roles.

Scope change

The bill's scope expanded from regulating only automated decision systems used by privately owned and publicly owned utilities to also establishing a separate AI model standards regime for electrical and gas corporations, and extending policy adoption requirements to community choice aggregators and local publicly owned electric utilities.

SCOPE

Added a new section (8510) requiring the PUC to adopt standards for electrical or gas corporations' use of artificial intelligence models by January 1, 2028. These standards must cover disclosure of AI model types, identification of impacted job classifications, safety and reliability safeguards, human review requirements, and workforce protection.

Extended the bill's reach to community choice aggregators (required to adopt an AI policy consistent with PUC standards) and local publicly owned electric utilities (same requirement), which were not covered in the introduced version.

ENFORCEMENT

Gave the PUC explicit authority to prohibit an electrical or gas corporation's use of a specific AI model if the commission finds deployment would negatively impact safe, affordable, and reliable service.

REQUIREMENT

Required electrical and gas corporations to file compliance plans demonstrating adherence to the new AI standards, with review by the Office of Energy Infrastructure Safety for wildfire mitigation models and mandatory consultation with impacted bargaining units.

Strengthened workforce protections by requiring that for any job classification responsible for human review of AI models, the utility must demonstrate its workforce plan maintains sufficient personnel so that review processes are not 'rendered nominal by understaffing.'

DEFINITION

Added a definition of 'artificial intelligence model' as an engineered or machine-based system that varies in its level of autonomy and can infer from input how to generate outputs influencing physical or virtual environments.

Updated the chapter title and legislative digest to reference both 'automated decision systems' and 'artificial intelligence models,' reflecting the dual regulatory framework now in the bill.

TIMELINE

Set a January 1, 2028 deadline for the PUC to adopt the new AI model standards.

Floor votes

How they voted

No floor votes recorded yet.

Full legislative history

Actions timeline

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Key actions

Committee

Amendments

May 18, 2026

Upper · Passed

Read second time and amended. Ordered to second reading.

upper

May 18, 2026

Upper · Passed

From committee: Do pass as amended. (Ayes 5. Noes 2. Page 4261.) (May 14).

upper

Apr 22, 2026

Upper · Passed

Read second time and amended. Re-referred to Com. on APPR.

upper

Apr 21, 2026

Upper · Passed

From committee: Do pass as amended and re-refer to Com. on APPR. (Ayes 7. Noes 2. Page 3957.) (April 20).

upper

Apr 14, 2026

Upper · Passed

From committee: Do pass and re-refer to Com. on P., D.T., & C.P. (Ayes 13. Noes 3. Page 3842.) (April 13). Re-referred to Com. on P., D.T., & C.P.

upper

Feb 18, 2026

Committee

Referred to Coms. on E., U & C. and P., D.T., & C.P.

upper

Feb 10, 2026

Introduced

Introduced. Read first time. To Com. on RLS. for assignment. To print.

upper

1 primary · 0 co-sponsors